


It's not like I liked you anyway

by Jay Tryfanstone (tryfanstone)



Category: The Warriors (1979)
Genre: Antagonism Leads to Sex, Canon Typical Homophobic Insults, Coney Island, Dominance Struggle, Fighting Kink, Funfairs, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Sex as an Assertion of Dominance, Smut Swap 2017, Smut Swap Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-12 23:01:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10501251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tryfanstone/pseuds/Jay%20Tryfanstone
Summary: To all the boppers out there, rumor has it that those boys from the Warriors are lighting up the sky tonight with a very special electric show.  There’s a leadership challenge going down on Coney Island, and the boys are making a run through the Pleasure Palace – yes, you heard me right, that’s the old funfair out on West Shore, and every gang in the city has an open invitation. Pull on your colors, spiff up your shoes, don’t come packing, and head on to down to C.I., boppers, it’s party night.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [redcandle17](https://archiveofourown.org/users/redcandle17/gifts).



They come from the Bronx, from Queens, from Manhattan, from Staten Island, from Chelsea, from Long Island, from Washington Heights. The Hoboken Tunnelers shrug into their Armani suits and polish their cufflinks, the Brooklyn Divas shimmy into their sequined gowns and paste crystals to their false eyelashes, and the Grandmasters pool their batteries and hoist their ghetto blasters. The Borinquen Blazers tilt their straw hats to the perfect angle and smooth their shirts until every pinstripe lies ruler-straight. The Papis and the Sweet Marias share a stretch limousine, the Riffs pack three old Greyhound coaches, and the Turnbull ACs string fairy lights over the armoured panels of their battlewagon. Across the map of the city gang after gang boards the subway, strutting down the tunnels, swinging through the turnstiles, claiming temporary territory in carriages tagged by every artist in New York. The Meatpackers, the Gremlins, the Lizzies, the Jackson Street Masai, the Singin’ Hinnies and the Unionists, the Moonrunners, the Plains People, the Bushwick Runners and the Villagers and the Hurricanes and the Jones Street Boys are moving south, heading for the sound of surf on the Coney Island beaches. 

At Ocean Parkway, at NY Neptune, they crowd the platforms and staircases, massing on the avenues, making rainbow skeins of the beachfront promenade. The setting sun gilds embroidered colors and matched insignia, sends long shadows marching across the cracked concrete of the sidewalk and glints from matched sunglasses. The Barbershop Boys are singing, the Black Eyed Susans have brought two fiddlers and a bass guitarist, and every beachfront block is guarded by silent Riffs, pristine and stone-faced. They’re heading west towards the great dark skeleton of the Wonder Wheel, past the burned out store fronts and empty lots, rattling closed shutters, a sea of gang members and hanger-ons and prospects, all colors and pride. 

“Hey! You see that? Must be a thousand of us out on the sidewalk.”

“Keep it tight, boppers. Keep cool.”

“Swan? Yeah. Fuckin’ A. Pullin’ this kinda shit takes some balls, know what I mean?”

As the crowd grows, all along the sea front store blinds are coming down and awnings snapping into place, blazing neon advertising burgers and fries and coffee and milk shakes and barbecue. Nathan’s is open again, lining up frankfurters on the grill and mustard on the side, chilling vats of coleslaw and potato salad. The cotton candy bowls are spinning and the ice cream carts are trundling out of the warehouses, and at Sal’s Girlie Revue the band strikes up and a man in a scarlet waistcoat trots out a well-worn patter, step on up and come inside, we know you want to see _everything_ – ladies, lemme warn you this show is _not_ for the modest. There’s sawdust on the floor of the Last Chance Saloon and glass mason jars of kirsch-soaked cherries in the window of the cocktail bar, hot dogs are a dollar, po’boys are two, and wings, wings are nearly free. Step up! Step up! 

Underneath it all, under the buzz of the electric lights and the hum of the generators, the laughter and the hustle of the crowds, the sound of a thousand marching feet, is the deep dragging growl of the Coney Island surf.

At the end of the boardwalk, facing the ocean, crouches the black hulk of the Pleasure Palace. Burned out, torn down, a framework of girders spanning the sky, black as a coalmine, scarred as street-fighting tomcat, the old funfair stretches its muscles and waits. Only the great arch of its entrance, the grimacing clowns freshly painted and the entrance gates gleaming steel, is lit up. In front of it, a wooden stand holds the ranking members of the Warriors, their Warlord, unsmiling, dark blond hair blowing in the wind from the sea, their Warchief, dark and glowering, their Arbiter, the feathers in his headdress shifting as he bends to one messenger after another. The Riff’s Warlord is there, consulting with the Warrior’s Arbiter, an honor guard of his own men standing to attention at the back of the platform. As the sun sets, the men and women of the gangs of New York gather there, huddled against the cool of the evening, feet in the sand, eyes on the archway and the platform. 

“What’s up?”

“Come all the way down here for nothin’...”

“See her? That’s their treasurer. I’m telling you, man, she was Warlord of the Orphans.”

“Hey. Hey! Are you hasslin’ me? Huh? Lost your tongue? Yeah, right – whoa! What the - No. I ain’t lookin’ for trouble. Okay. I gotcha. Fuckin’ Riffs...”

The loudspeaker crackles. Across the bay, the sun’s a line of gold on the horizon. Patchworked and jury-rigged, on the far shore the city’s skyscrapers crackle into electric light, and on the platform the Warrior’s Arbiter steps forward.

“Brothers and sisters,” he says, tall and steady, “I welcome you tonight to the Pleasure Palace. For tonight only, we invite every one of you to our opening party. Three years ago we assembled at Van Cortlandt Park. We vowed then to take our city back. You know how that ended,” he says, and behind his back the Warlord of the Riffs is stiff behind the shield of his sunglasses. “Here on Coney Island, we, the Warriors, vowed to rebuild our streets. We cleaned up our parks. We built a school. We supported our local businesses and kept our streets safe. And tonight – tonight! – we welcome you to the rebuilt, repainted, reopen Pleasure Palace. Two hundred and fifty thousand light bulbs! Three thousand tins of paint! Four hundred attendants! Thirty-eight rides! All we ask – all we ask – is that tonight and every night, our fellow gang members, observe the Palace, the sea front, and the subway routes as neutral ground. We want you to come back. We want you to come back with your families, with your best girl and your best boy, with your brother, your sister, your _abuela_ , your long-lost pal from Cleveland or Anchorage or Tijuana, and we want you to show them what Coney Island is all about. In a moment – one moment – we’re gonna turn on the lights and open up the gates. But,” he says, and now his voice drops and he turns his head, looking at the tall figure of his Warlord. “But...”

Swan is looking across the stage, chin up, the long line of his jaw and his cheekbones shadowed gold in the last of the light. From the opposite corner, his Warchief glares back at him, clenched fists and squared shoulders. Ajax, caught in the spotlight, twitches. Swan could be a steel statue.

“Tonight the Warriors honor our Warlord Swan and our Warchief Ajax as they battle for leadership. Tonight, Warlord and Warchief will run through the Pleasure Palace, taking on every challenge we, the Warriors, lay down for both these worthy officers. Only one of them will win this challenge. Only one of them will be worthy to lead us, the Warriors. And tonight and for the only time, the _last time_ -” He is looking at Ajax. The Warchief nods, a single jerk of his chin. “- you will witness this challenge. We will commence, in fifteen minutes, at the steeplechase. Tonight, the Warriors welcome you to Coney Island. We are _open_!”

The lights go up. The lights go up, thousands of them, on an enchanted city, a magical landscape, a moonscape, patterning the towers and balconies and porticos, the sweeping ribbons of the roller coasters and the pillars of the helter skelters, the steel racetrack of the steeplechase and the hoops and whirls and ropes of the Parachute Drop and the Flyer and the Human Roulette, a beckoning beacon of the absurd and the unreal and the macabre, a haunting, glittering explosion. The Wonder Wheel is a dizzying hoop of light. The clown’s heads gleam, white and scarlet, the carousel organ strikes up the _Beer Barrel Polka_ , and above the great opening gates, in lights, in the biggest tag-line any of them have ever seen, the Warriors lay claim to the city’s greatest funfair.

The crowd roars.

_Well, boppers, it looks like the Warriors have surpassed themselves tonight. That group from Coney Island have pulled off one of the biggest gambles this city has ever seen, and if you’re not at the Pleasure Palace, why not. But are the Warriors flying too close to the sun? Rumor has it some of the Warriors are uneasy at this new direction. Stay tuned._

The scaffolding above the steeplechase gleams dark steel, and the polish on the new pine floor of the starting gates is already scuffed. Rembrandt, the Warrior’s artist, shuffles his feet across it, not acknowledging the respectful nods of Warriors and Riffs, fingers itching at the strap of his bag, staring at extravagent paintwork and gilding of the rides below. Swan, reaching the top of the laddder, touches him on the shoulder. “You should be proud,” he says.

Rembrandt’s answering smile is tragic. 

The starting gates are crowded, but an uneasy space surrounds challenger and Warlord. Spotlights rigged on the roof of the Palace gleam on Swan’s bare shoulders and Ajax’s belt buckle. When the Warchief’s chin edges up a notch, the single gold earring in his ear glints gold. His eyes are narrowed, and his hands, in their fingerless gloves, are clenched. 

There is a broad, red ribbon stretching across the top of the track. Beyond it, freshly painted wooden horses arch their necks, manes and tails blowing in the sea breeze. The scaffolding thrums, and the steel track in front of the horses is a silver ribboned gleam, sliding into shadow. 

A drum sounds, once.

“Gentlemen,” the Arbiter says, stepping forward. “No weapons. May the best man-”

“Fucking _faggot_ ,” Ajax spits. 

“You never were very bright,” Swan says. “It takes a man to recognize when he’s wrong.” 

Behind him, the lights of the Pleasure Palace make the sky a box of jewels, pearl-strung, diamond bright. Crowds are still flooding in through the great gates, laughing and shouting, a flung boater sending red ribbons flying over their heads. Music echoes from the park, the impatient rattle of timpani, the rumble of the bumper cars, the cheerful, tinny organ of the steam carousels. Coins rattle into the cash drawers of the rides, dollar bills waving above matching baseball caps and afros and bowlers – two to one on Swan! Place your bet! – and the steeplechase is lined with intermingled gang members, internecine arguments and territory disputes laid aside for this one night. 

“I’m a Warrior. Not a fuckin’-” Ajax’s clenched fist thrusts at the park. “Fairy.”

Swan says nothing. His chin is up, his eyes steady. 

The Arbiter glances between them. He has one hand on Swan’s chest, fingers splayed over the dark silk of his colors and the pale skin of his chest. The other is raised, holding Ajax back. “Warchief.”

“Fuck,” Ajax says. “I can’t – Cochise, you know I can’t, this ain’t what the Warriors are all about, I don’t even fucking know-”

“What the fuck,” Swan says, “Did you think we were fighting for? A wasteland?”

Ajax’s breathing has quickened. He’s bitten his lip, saliva gleaming wet in the spotlights. His eyes are fixed on Swan’s face, drop to his mouth, flick up again to meet his gaze. 

Swan snorts. “ _Faggot_ ,” he says, quietly contemptuous. 

Ajax lunges forward, the Arbiter blocks him, and in front of the horses the Warrior’s treasurer cuts through the ribbon with a Japanese Katana. As the sliced ends flutter free, the drum sounds again, beating out a roll as fierce as a warcry, and Swan spins and races for the horses. Left behind, Ajax has to hop, flat-footed, slips on the fresh polish, and falls forward towards the starting gates. Swan’s already vaulting onto his horse, hands tangled in its mane, the press of his knees into its wooden flanks stretching his cords across his narrow hips and ass. 

“Get me on the fucking horse!” Ajax yells. 

He’s scrabbling at his saddle, glaring as Swan’s horse shudders into motion. The tracks shimmer. Ajax is half on, half off, feet kicking. He snatches for something to hang onto, stretches out, clings to the horse’s neck. He’s moving. The other horses too are juddering out of the starting gates, an artificial, gravity-powered fairground race, heading down into the sea of faces. Swan is crouched over his horse’s neck like a street racer on a nitro-powered dragster. Ajax, yelling, flings his weight from side to side, rocking the horse on its track. The horses are gathering speed, running down the steel of their track into the dip, and the roar of the crowd rises to meet them. Beyond, the track rises again, and then curves around the side of the Palace. 

On the platform, Rembrandt and the Arbiter look at each other. The Arbiter nods. Rembrandt checks the strap of his bag, and runs for the ladder.

By a head, Swan wins the race. He’s leaping from his horse, long legs reaching as he runs for the Palace entrance, gaining time as Warriors, arms linked, hold back the excited crowd and force him towards the hooped curtains of the entrance stage. Behind Swan, Ajax swears as he runs, head down, arms pumping. 

Warlord and Warchief run through the curtains into a blaze of footlights. They’re inside the Palace, racing across a stage that was once shielded by a great glass roof and now lies under the shell of fire-blackened girders. The curtains are paper and the friezes with their clown’s heads and elephants are paper-mache, but the blinding lights and the heave and shuffle of the crowd is the same as it was in the Palace’s heyday. “Warlord!” “Warlord!” “Ajax!” they shout. 

The stage is set with a guard line of grinning Warriors armed with birches and canes. Between them, Warlord and Warchief will be running the gauntlet towards a great tumbling barrel, their route from the stage to the staircase, down onto the floor of the Palace.

Swan doesn’t miss a step. His arms come up, guarding his face, while he powers across the stage so fast the first two strokes miss. Then a cane, snapping at his ass, raises a white chalk welt on the back of his cords, and birches fail above the melee. Swan is forcing his way through, pushing and shoving. 

Behind him, Ajax has stopped running. He’s standing on the stage, a slow, wide smile spreading across his face. He cracks his knuckles. Then he walks forward, still grinning. His first swing takes out two prospects. His second sends one of the Warriors spinning across the stage, crashing through the barrier, falling flailing into the crowd. Ajax is diving into the mass of bodies around his Warlord, striking out in focused bursts, eliminating one Warrior after another, an unstoppable force. “Ajax!” the crowd cries out. “Ajax! Ajax! Ajax!” It’s a warning that splits the Warriors in front of him. They fall back. Ajax is gaining time. Swan’s six feet ahead of him. Five. Four. And then – then Swan’s gone, tumbling forwards, and Ajax’s feet go from under him and he’s tripping, stumbling, grasping at air. 

Between stage to staircase the great wooden barrel, spinning, guards their route. 

Swan, stepping forward, has sprawled flat out. He’s trying to pull himself forward, his back arched, feet pushing against spinning slats, snatching a glance over his shoulder. Rolling as he falls, Ajax grabs for Swan’s ankle, snatches his jeans, and drags him backwards. They’re tumbling over each other, spun by the barrel, pressed together. Kicking out, Swan catches Ajax in the jaw, a glancing blow that knocks his head against the wood of the barrel. Furious, Ajax gets a hand in Swan’s belt and claws at Swan’s back. They roll together, legs tangling, too close for either of them to throw a punch. Ajax, inching his way forward by brute force, has managed to get a hand in Swan’s hair. Methodically, he’s trying to slam Swan’s head against the slats. Swan’s fighting back, all elbows and knees, one fist clenched in Ajax’s shirt and the other reaching for the rim of the barrel. Ajax isn’t going to let him go. “Give it up!” he’s yelling, Swan’s hair in his mouth. “Give it-”

Violently, Swan knees Ajax in the balls. Ajax convulses, hands flying down to cradle his crotch. His mouth is open, pained, his chest heaving.

Swan reaches for the edge of the barrel and pulls himself out. He pauses at the top of the stairway, staring down at the screaming crowd, and then spares a glance for Ajax. His Warchief is ignoring the tumble of the barrel for the pain in his balls, but the glare he’s directing at Swan could blister paint. 

Swan nods. As he turns back to the staircase, he hesitates. He flicks a swift, assessing look back at Ajax, and then walks around the edge of the barrel. There, he reaches down, and picks something off the ground. It’s a small metal canister. Swan tosses it in his hand, lights picking out the curve of the handle and the angular spout. He’s found a grease gun, abandoned by the construction crew, heavy with oil. Smiling, Swan tucks it into his back pocket and heads to the staircase, and as he does gears rumble into action. The top stair shivers. When Swan steps down, the stair moves with him, grinding downwards. He’s leaning forward, reaching, but the whole staircase is moving, split in two, one side sinking and the other rising. Swan, evidentially, was not prepared. He’s overbalanced, falling forwards, and there is no handrail.

Behind him, Ajax has pulled himself out of the barrel. He’s standing, gingerly, straightening, one hand still cupped around his balls in unselfconscious protection. 

When he sees Swan stumble on the staircase, wincing, Ajax runs. A flying leap lands him on the up stairs, flinging him backwards as Swan, sprawled, sinks beneath him. Ajax’s outreached hand misses him by a whisker. Yelling in frustration, Ajax reaches out again, but Swan has mastered the rise and is crawling upwards. Aiming for his belt, Ajax catches the bottom of his jeans and howls, grimly hanging on as the staircases move apart. Swan stretches for the next stair, the muscles of his shoulders and back bunching as he heaves himself forward, head-first. His belt cuts into his back, dragged backwards by Ajax’s grip, baring the smooth line of his spine, light glinting from the fine gold hair in the small of his back. Swan’s narrow hipped and his ass is small and tight: fabric, stretching, inches backwards. The cleft of his ass comes into view, moon pale.

“Get some!” yells one of the Lizzies, and wolf-whistles.

Distracted, Ajax looks up, smiles, all his gap-toothed teeth on display, and heaves again. 

The stairs have switched direction. Ajax and Swan smash together in the middle, yelping. Swan, prepared, is sprawled over both sides of the staircase, his fist perfectly aimed for Ajax’s chin, while Ajax, suddenly under attack, is still tugging his hands free. Swan gets in one perfect punch, blood blooming under his fist as Ajax’s lip splits, and then suddenly misses his step. The stairs drag them apart. Swan’s stretching backwards, trying to keep position, but Ajax’s feet are now above his head, and when he gets a fleeting grip it’s only on the hem of Ajax’s cords. They rip. Swan’s left with nothing more than a scrap of material in his hand as he tumbles down the last few steps.

The crowd roars. Swan, on his hands and knees on the broad motionless round of the human roulette well, stares up.

Tucked into his sock, Ajax is carrying a switchblade. 

“No weapons!” Swan shouts. He’s on his feet. His voice carries over the shouts of the crowd, the voice of a Warlord, authoritative.

Ajax rides the staircase on the balls of his feet. He moves with it, slowly, down. And then up. He blots the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. “It’s not a weapon!” he says. “Come on. I’m not a cheater!”

“You forgot,” Swan says. He’s standing with his feet apart, head thrown back. Lights play with his hair, with the stretch of his colors across his shoulders and the curves of his biceps, the bones of his hands and the long lean line of his thighs. There are red welts on the small of his back and on his forearms.

“So what if I did?” Ajax shouts back. “I’m Warchief.”

Swan spreads his hands, leaves the words hanging. They stare each other down. Ajax shakes his head. The staircase takes him upwards. The crowd’s muttering, pushing to stare down at the broad, shallow dome of the human roulette wheel, shoving around the staircase. Someone flings a spray of flowers down onto the wheel, petals scattering, blood red.

Ajax reaches for his knife. “If it’s so important to you,” he says to Swan, “Fucking have it!” He throws.

The arc of the knife, steel and bone, is a perfect parabola. Swan, watching, is almost motionless. When he moves, it’s fast: he snatches the knife out of the air, tosses it once, and pockets it, fluid and assured. He hasn’t taken his eyes from Ajax. 

The crowd sways with the throw, a breath of motion. Swan nods at Ajax, turns, and sets foot on the roulette wheel. It moves, hesitating. The mechanism, grumbling, creaks. Swan hesitates for a second, weight on his back foot, and then strikes out for the center, where a raised hub offers the best grip. The wheel’s moving so slowly it only makes a quarter turn before he gets there, and Ajax is already at the base of the stairs.

Swan reaches for his pocket, pulls out the grease gun, and squirts the polished wood of the wheel. Oil, spreading, glistens. The wheel, slowly, gathers speed. Swan’s still not smiling. He balances easily on the center of the wheel, beckoning. “Come on then, _Warchief_ ,” he says. “Come and get it. You want it that bad? You’re gonna have to come through me. Faggot,” he adds, an afterthought.

Ajax flushes. It’s a hectic, blotchy color, running along his cheekbones and across his chest, under the neck of his shirt. But he’s still hesitating on the edge of the wheel, even as it gathers pace. 

“You know,” Swan says, “Maybe you are asking for it. Begging for it. Every word that comes out of your mouth. Sometimes I think you want someone to throw you down and shove a dick up your ass, make you take it, make you want-”

Ajax, screaming, races onto the wheel. His feet slip, but the force of his momentum carries him forward and sends him spinning into Swan, a clumsy, violent tackle that brings Swan to his knees and sends them both rolling across the wheel. They fetch up against the wall, slipping and slippery with grease. Ajax’s first punch slides past Swan’s chin: Swan’s fingers loose their grip on Ajax’s forearms, his fingers sliding on oiled skin. Grease stains their clothes, makes their tussle into something fluid and unpredictable. They’re both sliding around the wheel. Ajax’s got a grip on Swan’s back pocket, slowly tearing it open: Swan pins Ajax, briefly, the triumphant arch of his back and pulled-back fist flung wide open when Ajax squirms free. The crowd, watching, groans in sympathy and shouts in support. For a moment, it’s Ajax on top, his grin feral, his hair falling in his eyes, and then Swan kicks off the wall and sends them both rolling into the center. He’s all lean, cunning strength, tireless. Ajax, furious, the hectic flush still riding his face, is all undirected, careless power, his fists crashing down time after time on wood as Swan twists away, sneaking in punch after damaging punch.

Around the wheel, the crowd shouts encouragement, applauds, raises their bets, groans in disappointment and urges the fighters on. The wheel’s speeding. Ajax looses his grip on Swan’s pocket. Swan gets a slipping grip on Ajax’s hair and smashes his face into the hub. Ajax comes up swinging, misses his footing, and slides into the wall. “Fag bastard!” he’s shouting. He spits out a tooth. He’s panting, sweat streaking the silk of his colors.

Swan goes after him. His dive brings them both down, rolling them against the wall, Swan’s weight pinning Ajax against the spin of the wheel. He’s got his hands rolled in Ajax’s t-shirt, holding him down. Ajax is scrabbling, kicking, up on his hands and knees with Swan’s weight on his back. He shakes his head. Sweat and grease spatter the wood. His chest is heaving. His knee slips. His thighs are shaking with strain.

Swan whispers in his ear. Ajax shakes his head. He reaches back, flailing, trying to push Swan away, but Swan’s thighs tense and his grip holds. Bucking, Ajax tries again, and only succeeds in flattening both of them. The wheel’s really spinning now, pushing them both into a slow, sliding roll, pinned together. The crowd roars, rattling the rail around the wall. Again, Swan says something. Ajax’s negation is a sharp rejection. 

Swan bites him. Rips at him, strong white teeth on Ajax’s earlobe, a tearing, vicious strike that leaves bright red blood trickling down Ajax’s neck and forces a howl from his throat. The crowd howls with him, delighted. Ajax beats a fist off the wall, his face an anguished, incredulous grimace, and tries again to heave Swan off. Fails. He is, unmistakably, weakening.

Now, Swan’s smiling. It’s a small smile, unconscious, the corners of his mouth tucked in and his eyes half-closed. He closes his fists and rips. Ajax’s shirt splits under his colors. When Swan, braced, drags it backwards, it pins Ajax’s arms. Swan’s on his knees between Ajax’s thighs. He’s pulling back, tugging at Ajax’s colors. Ajax fights, twisting against Swan’s hold, failing. Swan braces a knee on his ass and forces his elbows into the small of his back. He's stripping Ajax bare, taking his colors and his pride, winning.

When Ajax’s colors finally come free, the force of it flings Swan back, and the spinning wheel takes him to the opposite wall. He rides the round of it on both feet, one triumphant hand in the air. Ajax’s colors, Swan’s prize, is his victory flag. The crowd screams his name. Warriors have their fists in the air. “ _Swan_!” “ _Swan_!”

Still on his knees, Ajax, bare-chested and gleaming with oil, is frozen for a full spin of the wheel. Then, slowly, he pats at his arms, his chest, stares down at himself. His shoulders have slumped. Gang members in the crowd wince and groan in sympathy. He’s naked without his colors, lost, tribeless. 

Passing the gate in the surrounding wall, Swan lunges for it, clings to it one-handed against the spin of the wheel, and kicks it open. Ajax is still on the other side of the wheel. Back on solid ground, the crowd parting around him, Swan’s looking back. He flourishes Ajax’s colors. “Come and get them.” His voice is quiet, but Ajax hears him. “If you can.”

When he turns for the Funhouse, Swan walks, head up. He’s folded Ajax’s colors, holds them in his hands like a flag, an offering. Communion. The crowd clears his way. “Warlord,” they mutter. Hands flutter over his oiled skin, not touching. “Swan.” 

Someone shouts, “Warriors!” and the crowd takes the word up, full-throated, fists pumping. “Warriors!” “ _Warriors!_ ”

At the entrance to the Funhouse, Swan stops, turning. He lets himself look over the crowd, but his eyes go, inevitably, to his Warchief, doggedly pursuing through a crowd that is not looking kindly on his stumbling, violent route. 

Swan says, “We are not finished.” 

There is a bruise on his cheekbone. Blood has stained his knuckles. His stance, at the top of the wide staircase, is regal. 

As Ajax reaches the base of the stairs, Swan opens up the colors in his hands. “Yours,” he says.

“Mine,” Ajax acknowledges. There’s a harsh edge to his voice, the word gritted out. 

“You want them back? Then kneel,” Swan says. 

He does not look away. Ajax does. His eyes skip to the open roof and the night sky behind it, the great arch of the Wonder Wheel seen though girders, the faint laughter from the stage and the human roulette wheel. His shoulders are tight, hunched, and one hand opens and closes at his side. The blood trickling from his ear has slowed and, in drying, darken ed. 

“Ajax,” Swan says. Commands.

Pushing through the crowd, Rembrandt stands at Ajax’s shoulder. Cochise is behind him, grabbing Ajax’s arm, holding him still, talking. Ajax shakes his head. Cochise is still talking. Ajax is looking at Swan. He shakes Cochise off, bites at his lip. Fresh blood blooms scarlet against his skin.

Slowly, as awkwardly as if his knees are stiff, Ajax kneels. 

Swan walks down the steps. He reaches out. He twists his hand in Ajax’s hair and tugs his face up. They’re both slippery with oil, soaked in it: Swan’s knuckles are pale with the force of his grip and the tendons in Ajax’s neck are pulled taut. Ajax stares back. His face is level with Swan’s belt. He hasn’t let his eyes drop, but the flush on his cheeks has not faded, and fresh sweat has sprung out in the small of his back.

“I could tell you to take my dick right here,” Swan says, very quietly. “And you’d do it.”

His adam’s apple bobbing, Ajax swallows. For a long moment, they stare at each other. The crowd quietens, shuffling, craning to see.

Ajax blinks first.

“Put them on,” Swan says. He lets go, holds Ajax’s colors out to him. 

Still on his knees, looking up, Ajax does. “Warchief,” Swan says. Reaffirms.

The crowd, caught in tension, shouts, the sound of it a release that thunders throughout the Palace. They stamp their feet, roaring approval, shaking the lights, rattling the woodwork, thumping the new planks of the dancefloor. Empty handed, Swan is still looking back at Ajax.

He jerks his head.

When he turns his back and walks up the stairs to the Funhouse, Ajax follows. 

The second they’re through the archway Swan’s hand is back in his hair and he’s slammed up against the first of a hundred mirrors. Reflected, Ajax’s face looks back at him, his eyes wide and black and his mouth gaping. Fresh blood smears the mirror. Swan’s knuckles have split again, and Ajax is still bleeding.

“Don’t you ever,” Swan hisses in his ear, “ever do that to me again.”

Ajax says nothing. The mirror shows sweat gather and drip, elongated, on his temples. His own knife is pressed, pointedly, into his kidneys. Lean, muscled, Swan’s thighs press his apart. The crowd outside is chanting Swan’s name.

“You don’t have to like what we’re doing,” Swan says. “But that’s not your job. Don’t challenge me again.”

“No,” Ajax grunts. 

His breath mists on the mirror. A door slams. The noise of the crowd fades to a heavy murmur. The Funhouse has a kaleidoscope roof, painted glass. Shards of color wheel across the ranked mirrors, elongated, compressed, stretched into ribbons and folded into fragments. Every mirror has a different image, endlessly distorted.

“Animal,” Swan grunts. He’s flat against Ajax’s back, fist clenched on the handle of the knife. The hand in Ajax’s hair tightens. 

Ajax shudders. Helplessly, he leans into Swan’s hands. The noise in his throat is a breathy whine. 

“You like it,” Swan says. He’s so close his breath overlaps with Ajax’s, his hair brushing Ajax’s cheek. The knifepoint is emphatic. “You’re gonna spread for me and _love_ it, aren’t you, Warchief? Betcha dream of this. Betcha dream of someone fucking the shit out of you. Betcha-”

“Fuckin’ A, Swan, just fuckin’-”

The knife slashes through his belt. Swan is dragging him back by the hair, forcing him down, coming after him. Their reflections flash across the mirrors, swollen legs and spindly arms and distorted faces. The bulge of Swan’s dick in his pants seems gigantic. “Yeah, you want it,” Swan is muttering. “You like this? You like the way this is going?”

When Ajax jams his zip down and drags his cords over his ass, his hands are shaking. “Yeah. Do it,” he says. “Fucking do it, do me, I fucking dare you-” He’s on his knees, struggling with the tangle of his pants, arching his back. “Do-” The word ends in a gasp. Swan’s dragging his face down, hand in his hair, knee between his, pinning him down. Against Ajax’s ass, Swan’s knuckles jab and poke as he works his zip. His colors, hanging loose, dangle and drag at Ajax’s bare skin. When he jabs his fingers in Ajax’s ass, minimally greased, Ajax jerks and heaves. His breath is sobbing in his throat.

“You’d better be clean,” Swan hisses. His fingers come back, oiled, held straight, forceful. Ajax hollows his back into their thrust, leaning into a different angle. Swan’s warning slap is a harsh crack of his palm on skin. “I’m not doing this for you.” He’s got both knees between Ajax’s. The weight of his belt buckle swings, heavy and sharp, against Ajax’s inner thigh. 

“Ain’t no fucking-”

One-handed, Swan spreads Ajax’s cheeks and forces his dick through the flinching gape of his asshole in jerky bursts, dominant, triumphant. His buttocks clench as he thrusts, releases, clenches and pushes again. His knees push Ajax’s apart, fighting for more leverage. “Come on, come on, come on,” he mutters. 

Ajax’s elbows go from under him. He’s shaking, his body giving up in juddering shudders. Swan’s grip slips and bruises. “Yeah, knew it, gotcha,” he says, the rhythm of his words the same as every jerking thrust. Sweat drips from his hair onto Ajax’s neck and darkens the stretch of his colors. “C’mon, you’re gonna, getcha there...”

Pushing back, Ajax is a beat behind, uneven and desperate. He’s grinding his hips, shaking, head down, fingernails digging into the floorboards. Swan’s thrusts are brutal, shoving them both towards the mirrors, even as a machine. 

“I’m gonna-”

“Yeah, you are,” Swan says. His fingers tighten on Ajax’s hips, bruising.

When he comes, Ajax grunts, helpless and breathy. His body tenses, his knees shaking, and then unstrings so quickly Swan’s grip fails. He’s torn free, his dick pulled out of Ajax’s body, bobbing and glistening. Hissing through his teeth, Swan takes hold, and tugs himself off in four violent, staccato strokes. He’s pushed Ajax’s colors up around his shoulders, coming, silent, in scanty opaque dribbles over Ajax’s back. 

Ajax is breathing in uneven gasps. 

“We done?” Swan says. “Ajax. We done?”

“Not a...fucking faggot,” Ajax mutters. His fingers, shaded a flickering green, clench into fists. 

Swan squeezes the last drop of semen from his dick, shakes it clean. His weight shifts, his forearms tensing, the hard muscles of his knees pushing against Ajax’s thighs as he moves. “Soldier,” he says. 

Ajax opens his eyes and looks up, into the shattered rank of mirrors. An uneasy reflection, Swan is looking back at him, their faces set one above another, twinned. In the electric light of the Wonder Wheel, striking through the girders, the stained glass of the cupola, Swan’s blonde hair tangles red and gold. Ajax’s mouth is swollen and the cut on his lower lip is scabbing. His knuckles are scarlet, his drying blood smeared across the floorboards. 

“Warlord,” Ajax says. His voice is thick. “Swan.” His fists open, relax.

Swan sits back on his heels. Ajax shifts, awkward and uncomfortable, the bruises on his hips blooming. Sticky and wet, his belly grits against the floorboards. He winces.

In the mirror, Swan’s eyes snap up. The muscles of his shoulders move. He’s tucking himself away, the action perfunctory: the metallic hiss of his zip and the clink of his belt buckle sound abnormally loud in this hall of echoing images. 

“Sit up,” Swan says.

Ajax’s hands are clumsy on the waistband of his cords as he drags them over his hips. His vest pocket has a rip at the corner. He drags at a loose thread, snaps it off, tugs at the next thread, and the next, his fingers fumbling. He looks up. Swan is looking away, the long line of his jaw and his cheekbone shadowed in kaleidoscope blues and greens, patterned as a carnival mask.

“Don’t make this into something it isn’t,” Swan says. He’s toying with the switchknife. The bruise on Swan’s cheekbone has ripened. His cords are ripped at one knee. His eyes seem slow, lazy eyelids, wide pupils.

His fingers smell of Ajax’s body. 

“Fuck you,” Ajax says, reflexive.

The muscle at the corner of Swan’s mouth ticks, once. He pockets the knife. “Come on,” he says. “Get up.” He’s already rising, the long line of his lean thighs unfolding. “I’m gonna get cleaned up.”

“What?” Ajax says.

The sound of the crowd has faded, the voices of hucksters drowned by the coming dawn. The laughing clowns are silenced. Surf grinds against the beach.

“The sea,” Swan says. He holds out his hand.

Ajax takes it. He lets himself be pulled to his feet. He falls into place a step behind Swan’s shoulders, behind the stretch of his colors over his shoulders. Together, they walk down the steps, under the arch, across the boardwalk, and drop down to the beach, their feet patterning the wet sand. The wind from the sea dries the sweat across Ajax’s shoulders and whips his hair into his eyes and away again. Swan’s a silhouette against the dawn. 

“Hey,” Ajax says. “Hey. Warlord.” 

“Warchief.” Swan’s turned. A wave licks at his sneakers. There was a king, once, who tried to command the ocean. It didn’t go well.

“You got me,” Ajax says.

“Yeah, I know,” Swan says.

**Author's Note:**

>   
>   
>   
>  The title’s from the Fun Lovin’ Criminals’ _Coney Island Girl_ , and there’s a quote in here too from Suzanne Vega’s _Ironbound / Fancy Poultry_ : _Backs are cheap and wings are nearly free / Nearly free_.


End file.
